This picture was taken on a recent trip that a friend and I took to visit Mars Hill Bible church in Michigan, one evening we drove over to the lake and found this harbour. It reminded me of something so I obsessivly took pictures of this and other harbours that we saw... however it turns out that Steve's shot was best...
A long time ago my wife (Lorna) and I were at meeting in a Vineyard church (we've been members of various Vineyard churches for about 15 years now)and when someone was praying for us they gave us a word or picture. (kind of an impression that popped into their head while they were praying for us that they thought may have been from God...) What they said was that we would be like a harbour, a place where people would be safe and could feel secure and protected.
In beginning to think about a church I don't think that this is a bad place to start ... I'd love it if I could ensure that everyone who came into anything we did could feel the way that I think God thinks of them. Unique, valuable, worthwile and loved regardless of their ideas, beliefs, culture or lifestyle.
Given how difficult it is to help people to feel this even when they are just coming into your family has anybody got any ideas about how you could do it with a church?
I was thinking...
# Stay small enough to welcome everyone.
# Be big enough that everyone can meet someone they can become friends with.
# Focus on Jesus and not on doctrine or traditions (as helpful as those things can be)
# Serve good coffee (and cake)
let me know your thoughts...
Dave
Hmmm....can't cut and paste quotes!
ReplyDeleteThe harbour wall is interesting because it's a boundary creating a safe space from the chaos (aka the sea). What would you do about that safety creating boundary yet still honestly accept people. Social World theory says we start off open but gradually form our closed worlds with clear in/out. How do you make people safe yet prevent that? It's hard to ride in the face of our human urge to classify and define. Unclear is unclean. do you want a dirty church? (Am I writing garbage?)
Hi acetate monkey ... welcome to the conversation...
ReplyDeleteI like the harbour thing because it's safe and open at the same time ... wouldn't work otherwise...
I'd want people to be totally free to come and to go (in the Vineyard they often say that means having big front doors and big back doors) but I's also like to give people real options to belong ... it's got to be about their choice not our requirement upon them... some people will be in and some will be out ... that's how life is (not a judgement) ... what I'm hoping is that the reason somebody would be out would be their choice rather than ours.
I think church is dirty when it's doing it's job properly ... Jesus definatly had a dirty following ... mixing collabotators, terrorists, prostitutes and priests... sounds pretty messy to me!
I guess a very important question is if we grow and a bunch of people start being part of a bigger group how do we make sure we don't become something that excludes?
And you're not writing garbage - thank you for taking the time to think about it.
Dave
Some friends of ours (plural) who took over a church recentloy, said of people leaving that they all said 'it's not about you', where-as in reality, part of it was about them, and everybody knew it. Church is all about relationships, and in a small church, relationships with the leaders, and how those leaders work with people is a big deal.
ReplyDeleteI guess I think the danger of big back doors, is that it often means that people can disappear quietly, and without being noticed or followed up. Often I imagine feeling somewhat shamed by leaving, for whatever reason. While it's a good growth model (go with the willing and the similar), I'm not sure it's a christlike model.
I wonder if one way thinking about it would be to say we have big front doors, and big front doors. Once you're with us, we have a commitment to you, and while you can walk away if it's not for you, we all come and go proudly through the front door, with heads held high.
Aside from the whole effect of not allowing people to leave in shame, or without notice as they don't matter, often the best feedback, will come from those leaving quietly through the back door.
Not suggesting of course that you meant this - simply following the conversation through.
Warmly
Steve
At our last church we were wont to describe ourselves as a field hospital - we took in damaged and injured people, and nursed them back to health. At which point, 4 out of 5 of them went off to do something else - back into the field, in a sense. A handful stayed, to become part of the "hospital" service, but not the majority. There were people who worried about that, feeling that there was something unhealthy about the level of turnover that we saw, but I thought it made a lot of sense. It didn't matter what we did, we could never get to be more than fifty or so people, almost as if God's vision for us was to be a small church, a family, that could only support a small number of new people, but could support them well.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if that resonates with your vision, or not. It seems to have similarities.
HI folks
ReplyDeleteSteve - I know what you mean about big back doors there's something about that that does worry me ... I was thinking about having an annual commitment to membership - maybe agreed each year at a sort of passover meal. That way if people want to commit it's not so easy to walk away and they know that people are committed to them. But it'd be renewable every year so that everyone always has an easy choice to leave if they want or need to ... also another excuse to roast lamb...
Also I know what you're saying about leaders ... "it's nothing personal but" which normally means that it really is personal but I also know that we're not gonna be everyone's cup of tea...
Dave
Ruth
ReplyDeleteHi there ... welcome to the conversation...
It kind of would be a bit like that in as much as we'd love to accept everyone no matter where they are at and that we'd not expect to grow a huge Church to be sucessful - small can be beautiful...
Dave